I was all down on The Web Planet yesterday, if only for all of the roadblocks it threw in front of me. And the ridiculous ant costumes.

This. I'm talking about this.

But it turns out that beneath the shoddy production values lies a quite imaginative and interesting story.

Let's talk about that.

Escape to Danger / Crater of Needles

So here's what is going on in the story, as we find out in various bits of exposition: The planet Vortis was once home to the moth-like Menoptera. The Zarbi (the giant ants with obvious human legs) were there as well, but they were unintelligent and more like cattle than anything else. Then along came an outside force called the Animus, which took control of the Zarbi and turned them into a military force. The Menoptera were driven off of Vortis, escaping to a nearby moon. The Animus, by way of the Zarbi, has enslaved the remaining Menoptera and has them working in a mine (at the titular Crater of Needles), feeding organic matter into acid pools that dissolve the raw material and draw it to the ever-growing structure known as the Carsinome. Deep underground there is also a hive of giant burrowing insects, which I think are a larval form of the Menoptera (if I followed that particular conversation correctly). At this point the Menoptera have massed an invasion force to infiltrate the Carsinome and destroy the Animus before the Carsinome has expanded too far and engulfed the entire planet.

This really is heady, complex world-building with lots of interesting moving parts. Over the course of these two episodes, Ian escapes from the cave where the Doctor and Vicki continue to be held, and links up with one of the Menoptera. Meanwhile, Barbara is enslaved at the Crater of Needles and ends up joining the Menoptera resistance force just as the spearhead of the invasion arrives. All the while, the Doctor leads along the Animus by trickling out information as slowly as possible while waiting for Ian to return with Barbara.

All in all, this story is a textbook case of the show's reach exceeding its grasp. This was a spectacularly bold story to attempt, and the show's miniscule budget does it no favors. On that level, if you want to gather your friends and have a good chuckle at bad 60's science fiction television, by all means grab some screenshots from this story and laugh away.

Ha, ha!

But if you do that, you are really selling the show short. Producer Verity Lambert knew what she was getting into with this story, but pressed ahead anyway with a desire to push the limits of what Doctor Who could achieve. The results are somewhat mixed, but not for lack of sincerity or talent. The movements of the Menoptera were choreographed by Roslyn De Winter, a well-known and well-respected choreographer of the time, and the resulting performances give both the Menoptera and the underground grubs a truly unique and alien feel. Similarly, the speech patterns and inflections for all of the insectoid parts are boldly unique. As for the costumes, I'm sure if the story were done today it would be filled to the brim with top-of-the-line CGI and frankly it would look just as dodgy, only in different ways. 

I started out hating this story, and now I am finding myself coming around to really admiring it in a "Don Quixote tilting at windmills" kind of way. How's that for a shocking turn of events?

STATS:

Doctor(s): First
Companion(s): Vicki, Ian Chesterton, Barbara Wright
Episode(s): Escape to Danger, Crater of Needles
I've Got to Admit: It's getting better
A Little Better?: All the time
Steps Walked: 6,516 today, 211,530 total
Distance Walked: 3.09 miles today, 95.67 miles total
Weight: 296.18 lbs (five day moving average), net change -11.12 lbs